Facade
by Luscious Kinney
Summary: How long did they think he could hold it back? Like it or not, chapter six up! Who knows, maybe infamy is better than fame... ;0)
1. In The Beginning

Brian stood and looked around the room as he found his jeans. It was few and far between that he would go to his trick's place when it was time to get down to it, and he felt uncomfortable. Little did he know the discomfort was for all the right reasons as he looked out the window of the apartment building and into the window parallel to his. He smiled as he watched a gay couple, a blond and a brunet make love.  
  
Let me elaborate. Brian and his tricks simply fucked, as did Brian and Justin. These two, as he had observed, were making love. Slow. Face to face and with their arms wrapped tightly around each other. They would lock into a kiss after staring blankly, blissfully, into each others eyes.  
  
"That brunet kid is a violin virtuoso. He plays the bejeezus outta that violin of his, and it's always so... soulful." Brian's trick stated as he handed Brian his shirt. "Now, you don't have to go home, but you can't stay here. Not when my partner will be home in a half hour."  
  
Brian put on his shirt, the person across the way suddenly registering. Ethan Gold. He sat and numbly slipped his socks and shoes on, then stood again and looked at his trick with that trademark Brian Kinney smirk. "Your partner." He rolled his eyes and laughed as he left, taking the stairs just as said partner came out from between the elevator doors. He took the stairs slowly, his jaw set as his mind wandered. There was no doubt that the blond he saw was Justin. Not one.  
  
As he reached the doorway, he looked through the pockets of his brown leather jacket and found his poppers. With a small frown, he tossed them away into a nearby wastebasket and left the apartment building. Only once had Brian Kinney ever felt as vulnerable as he did as he walked down the street, and that was when he held Justin's bloodied body in his arms, knowing not whether he would ever wake, or even be the same if he did.  
  
Later That Night:  
  
Back at Brian's loft, things were quiet. Justin sat at his drawing pad and began to sketch the first thing that came to his mind. He drew an hourglass shape using a rich, aged looking brown, then with a lighter brown, he filled in the body of the hourglass. With a silvery gray, he drew in strings, and switched to the original brown to draw the neck of the violin in behind the strings. He sighed wistfully and set down the pen, gently tracing the violin's contour with a gentle fingertip.  
  
Brian slid the door open and walked numbly in, not bothering to close it behind him. Justin looked up, erasing his lovesick expression and began to carefully blend the colors with the fingertip already on the pad. He tore it off, pretending to be displeased, and crumpled it up, tossing it in the wastebasket beside Brian's desk. He sighed and watched Brian walk past. "You're home early."  
  
Brian looked to the side and sneered at the boy. "Looks like you beat me here."  
  
Justin frowned and stood. "Fuck you, Brian."  
  
Brian walked through his bedroom and into his bathroom and replied in the same tone. "Not lately, Justin." He tossed his dirty clothes out onto his bed and climbed into the shower. Justin slammed his drawing pad down onto the desk and walked, as Brian had, through the bedroom and into the bathroom. He opened the shower door with some force, and stood before Brian.  
  
"What is your problem?" He barked. Brian reached out and took a handful of Justin's shirt, pulling him beneath the shower stream fully clothed. "What the fuck?!" He pushed Brian away and tried to get out of the shower, only to be pulled back again by the back of his shirt.  
  
He took the shirt clean off, his anger suddenly turning into lust as he shed the rest of his clothing. Before he let his jeans hit the floor, he pulled a condom out of the pocket and roughly turned Brian around. "You want fucked, Brian? Is this what you're giving me the cold shoulder over?"  
  
Brian set his jaw, pressing his forehead against the fogged over glass.  
  
"Your silence is purely initiative." Justin whispers. He hands Brian the condom. "Put it on me."  
  
For the first time in a long time, Brian's hands shook. He tore the top off of the wrapper with his teeth, spitting it out onto the shower floor. Slowly, hesitantly, he turned around and pulled the condom out. He applied it to Justin, who was already fully standing.  
  
Sternly, Justin spoke. "Turn back around." He took Brian by the shoulders and turned him roughly, pressing his forehead back to the glass...  
  
Brian woke alone to the suddenly cold stream in the shower. He failed to see the wispy streams of red washing down the drain with the clear. He pressed the shower door open, missing the bloody hand print he left there, downward rolling beads of condensation streaking through it like rain through mud.  
  
Breath came to him as though he had just risen from a deep sleep, in gentle sighs. He stood and stretched, his eyes refusing to register the blood spray across the mirror. He walked through the loft, oblivious to the bloody trail on the hardwood floor that started at the bathroom door and ended right behind the island in his kitchen. "Justin?"  
  
He walked toward the kitchen, still stark naked, and swore as he stepped into a cold puddle. "What the fuck, Sunshine? Can't you clean up after yourself like a good little twink?" He blindly grabbed for the towel hanging on the towel ring and looked down at the mess, seeing dark, dark red, offset by blond. He stepped back, stumbling, and fell on his backside.

**More to Come...**


	2. Revelations

"Hello?"  
  
Michael giggled into the mouthpiece of his cell phone as Ben placed gentle kisses along his jaw line and neck, stopping to nibble on his ear.  
  
A shaken, tear-drowned voice answered. "Mikey?"  
  
Michael set a gentle hand on Ben's shoulder, his suddenly concerned expression stopping Ben's show of affection for a moment. "Brian? What's the matter?"  
  
"Mikey I need you..." There was a long pause on the line, followed by the sound of a glass shattering and an angry sob. Brian hung up, unable to continue and speak coherently at the same time.  
  
Michael paled and closed his flip-phone. He stuffed it back in his pocket and stood. "Ben, I have to go and see Brian. Something's wrong."  
  
Ben raised an eyebrow. "You don't suppose promiscuity finally got the better of him, do you?"  
  
Michael shook his head, totally oblivious as to rhyme or reason...  
  
...Brian paced the loft. Justin's body had been removed after a mournful, sobbing call to the police and to the mortuary. Without a question, they took the corpse away and even cleaned up the puddle, Brian having earlier taken care of the small mess in the bathroom and from the bathroom to the puddle.  
  
He lay curled up in the center of his bed with one of Justin's cute little tee shirts. Once in a while he'd take in the boy's scent, tears brimming in his eyes. He heard the door of the loft roll open again, and he lifted his head, suddenly expecting Justin to walk through.  
  
"God!!!" He sobbed and curled up tighter, seeing that instead, Michael rushed across the floor toward him.  
  
Michael stopped in his tracks. His heart nearly ceased to beat in his chest at the sight of Brian reduced [emotionally] to nearly nothing. "Brian, what the fuck happened to you?" He very slowly willed himself further forward and sat beside his friend, pulling him gently up into an embrace.  
  
Brian was hesitant, at first, to touch Michael, but soon, his arms were wrapped around the other man, his head tucked safely into the place where his shoulder and neck meets.  
  
"Mikey... Something happened that I don't think I can explain." Brian stopped simply to breathe, as though the words were dragging precious breath away from his body.  
  
"Tell me?"  
  
Brian pulled away and looked into Michael's eyes. "I think I killed Justin."  
  
Michael's eyes widened and glazed over, his head suddenly swimming.

"He's... dead?"


	3. Epiphany

Michael pressed into a very soft, very loving kiss, his arms wrapped tight around Brian. Brian pulled back from the kiss, his expression more confused than frightened now.  
  
"Where is the proof that you did what you say you did?" Michael carefully posed.  
  
Brian put away the whiskey and got himself a glass of water. "There was blood on my hands, and in the shower, and on the mirror... a trail from the bathroom to the kitchen where I found him. Who else could it have been?" His chin began to tremble and again the tears began to fall.  
  
_You could do it again, Brian. So easily..._  
  
Brian felt ill. He backed a few steps away from Michael. "I don't think you should be here. I think it's best if I'm alone."  
  
"Bullshit." Michael replied softly.  
  
_You liked how it felt, Brian, how the boy's flesh resisted as we tore him open..._  
  
Brian paled. "You need to go." Sweat began to bead at his hairline. He watched as the corners of Michael's mouth turned down in distaste. In Brian's state of shock, psychosis, what-have-you, it happened in slow motion.  
  
Brian stepped back, the edges of his vision beginning to blacken. "Michael, get the fuck out of here."  
  
Michael's brow furrowed. "You called me Michael... Brian, I can't leave you like this. Not when we have to try and figure out who killed Justin..."  
  
_You could do it again, Brian. So easily...  
_  
Brian looked more desperate than he ever had in life. He plead with Michael, trying to move him toward the door.  
  
_Just think of it, Brian. His clothing, his flesh... almost melting beneath your blade, the warm red on your fingertips...  
_  
Brian suddenly stopped. His vision suddenly gave way to blackness, and the voice took over his mind.  
  
_Yes, Brian. Take him first. Give him what he has always wanted and then take what belongs to you... yes...Yes..._  
  
"No!" Brian shook the darkness away. "Mikey, believe me, whatever you are trying to do for me is valiant, etc; etc; But you need to get. The fuck. Out!" He used physical force to move Michael out of his loft and rolled the door closed behind him.  
  
Michael turned around and tried to open the door, finding it locked. He became frantic for a moment and began to beat on the door. "Let me in, Brian! What if the killer is still in there with you?!" Falling quiet, Michael realized that there was no logic to that and simply walked away rubbing the back of his neck, sore from tension.  
  
Brian waited until he could no longer hear Michael's footsteps outside and then watched his car pull away and drive down the street, of course, with him in it. "There is no what if, Michael. The killer lives here." 


	4. Flick Of The Wrist

**[(Disclaimer: I do not own Queen's "Flick of the Wrist")]**

All it took for Brian to feel like himself again was a nice thick joint. He smoked one down, showered, got into some clean clothes and headed to the parking garage for his jeep. He got in and looked in the rearview mirror.  
  
"The epitome of sex."  
  
He grinned and started up the jeep, then drove to Woody's, the local gay watering hole. As he entered the establishment, he hadn't noticed the fliers advertising a Queen cover band, the lead vocalist looking remarkably like the beautiful young Freddie Mercury.  
  
It can be assumed that every knowledgeable gay man on Liberty Avenue knew who Brian Kinney was, so it was no surprise to him when he walked in and Jaime's eyes caught Brian's, recognition fresh and alive in them. Jaime turned around and instructed his band on a rather impromptu number.  
  
The guitars began, and the daunting first verse drifted from between Jaime's lovely lips to everyone's ears through the speakers.  
  
_"Dislocate your spine if you don't sign he says  
I'll have you seeing double._

_Mesmerize you when he's tongue-tied Simply with those eyes. _

_Synchronize your minds and see The beast within him rise..."_  
  
Everyone in Woody's turned, trying to identify who Jaime's gaze rested upon and found it immediately in Brian. He flushed a little, recognizing the song, and sat on a barstool. "Whiskey sour. Double."  
  
The chorus began, and little did Brian know that it would almost give him away.  
  
_"Don't look back! Don't look back!_

_It's a rip-off _

_Flick of the wrist, and you're dead, baby"  
_  
Brian winced at that and took back his drink, quite directly ordering another.  
  
_"Blow him a kiss and you're mad. _

_Flick of the wrist- he'll eat your heart out _

_A dig in the ribs and then a kick in the head _

_He's taken an arm and he's taken a leg All this time honey... _

_Baby you've been had."  
_  
He glared at Jaime, which only fueled the fire. Jaime felt prompted, even obliged to go on.  
  
_"Intoxicate your brain with what I'm saying If not you'll lie in knee-deep trouble. _

_Prostitute yourself he says _

_Castrate your human pride _

_Sacrifice your leisure days Let me squeeze you till you've dried..."_  
  
Brian grit his teeth and tried with all he had in him to ignore the band and everything around him for that matter. His face reddened now more than flushed, and once again his hairline beaded with sweat.  
  
_"Don't look back! Don't look back! _

_It's a rip-off."  
_  
The band went into an instrumental, and Jamie kept an eye on Brian, noticing but not necessarily caring that something was wrong with what he was seeing. He licked his lips and smirked at Brian whenever Brian would turn, and let's face it, at that point, not even Brian knew why he would continue to acknowledge the man that was at that very moment mocking him.  
  
_"Work my fingers to my bones  
  
I scream with pain _

_I still make no impression. _

_Seduce you with his money-make machine _

_Cross-collateralize (big-time money, money) _

_Reduce you to a muzak-fake machine _

_Then the last goodbye- It's a rip off"_  
  
Brian stood and walked over to the stage. He stood near and watched Jaime, allure all about him suddenly.  
  
_If not Michael, why not him, Brian? He seems like one who would make such little trouble for you...  
_  
The voice startled Brian worse than it had before, as now he recognized who the voice belonged to.  
  
Jaime went into the last chorus, the crowd snickering and leering at Brian.  
  
_"Flick of the wrist and you're dead, baby  
  
Blow him a kiss and you're mad _

_Flick of the wrist- he'll eat your heart out _

_A dig in the ribs and then a kick in the head _

_He's taken an arm, and taken a leg. All this time, honey...  
  
Baby you've been had."_  
  
Jaime turned to the band again, alerting them to the fact that it was time for their half-hour intermission. He found himself being pulled roughly into a dark corner, kissed passionately, Brian's body against his, grinding, touching, panting...  
  
"_**A man was found murdered today in the bathroom at Woody's, an alternative drinking establishment on Liberty Avenue. The body was that of local man, 29-year-old Jaime Huston. Jaime was the lead singer of a Queen cover band who bore a very striking resemblance to Freddie Mercury, the front man to the real band Queen. Developments in this young man's case have yet to be reported, we will keep you updated every hour on the hour here at KPTS channel four. Good evening.**_"...


	5. Baby, You've Been Had

Hunter turned off the TV, tears welling up in his eyes. He pushed a strand of his blond hair back off of his face and furiously wiped away the escaped tears.  
  
Michael was still shaken from his encounter with Brian, but that didn't stop him from functioning normally. He passed Hunter by several times putting away clothes, dishes, basically being the housewife, and never once noticed his tears. Hunter stood and crossed the room. He got a bottled water out of the fridge and took a few sips, took a couple Excedrin and then started to head for his room.  
  
Michael stopped and set down his work. "Hunter, what's the matter?"  
  
Hunter stared in disbelief. "You passed me by nearly a half a dozen times and you never once took a look at me. Not that it's very fucking important to you, but one of my old friends was found murdered in the bathroom at Woody's." He grimaced, the Excedrin sticking in his throat, and he stalked off into his room, taking down liberal sips of the bottled water to free the caught pills.  
  
"Hunter- I..." The door slammed on Michael's response, leaving him to stand alone, mouth agape. For a moment, he mired through the awkward silence, sprinkled with muted sniffling coming from Hunter's room. Finally Ben broke the silence.  
  
"Hey, cutie." He came through the front door all smiles and set his book bag down. He approached Michael and wrapped his arms around the other man.  
  
"Ben. Ben, Ben, Ben am I ever glad to see you." He looked into Ben's eyes, his own smiling and kissed him. "Unfortunately, you've come home to a small problem."  
  
Ben's smile only faded a little, the bit that had left was replaced with worry. "I'm guessing it has something to do with Hunter."  
  
Michael nodded and gently pulled free from Ben's embrace, ready to take a seat after being on his feet all day. He turned on the TV, an hour having passed, and as though it had been (well) timed, a newsbreak interrupted a run of South Pacific. "Ben, I might be getting ahead of myself, but you may want to watch this with me."  
  
Ben shrugged, not yet understanding and fit himself behind Michael on the couch.  
  
"_**We interrupt your regularly scheduled programming for an urgent news break. There have been serious allegations in the murder of Jaime Huston. Brian Kinney, owner and founder of Kinnetics Advertising has been named the prime suspect in Huston's murder. We take you on-scene with Julie Lane. Julie?**_"  
  
Michael's eyes threatened to roll out of their sockets. "Holy fuck!!"  
  
Ben put a gentle hand on Michael's back. "Was that what I needed to see?"  
  
"No... Oh, shit." He fell silent as a cut-to brought a somewhat homely looking blond woman onto the screen. She stood in front of Woody's in her pastel blue suit, looking (for some reason) painfully smug.  
  
"_**Thank you, Maria. I'm standing in front of Woody's, a local gathering place for the gay and lesbian population of Pittsburgh where only 48 hours ago, 29-year-old Jaime Huston was found brutally murdered in this establishment's bathroom. The last person seen with Huston was prime suspect, Brian Kinney. Thus far, Kinney has been nowhere to be found. For channel four news, this is Julie Lane.**_"  
  
Michael was stunned. His hands trembled and all color seemed to drain from his face like water through a sieve. Ben got up off of the couch and kneeled in front of him. "Michael, talk to me." He reached up and cupped his palm against Michael's cheek.  
  
"Ben, when I turned on the news, I only expected a repeat of what Hunter must have seen..." 


	6. Blunt Force Trauma

Brian stood in his bathroom, trying to wash the blood off of his hands. He scrubbed his palms, fingertips, under his nails, the backs of his hands until the skin was red and raw, and then he would scrub them again. Something had taken over, the old Brian Kinney sitting somewhere in the recesses of his mind. Brian looked the same. He walked, talked, and acted the same...  
  
But looks can be deceiving.  
  
Somewhere behind the same brown eyes that used to be damningly expressionate no matter his behaviour lurked something brand new... something not so amicable to say the very least. As Brian finally dried his hands, he looked at himself in the mirror, jumping at the new reflection behind him.  
  
"Look, are we going to fuck, or can I just go and find someone else?"  
  
Young. Blond. Blue eyed and rather sassy. Brian stared into the eyes of a man he perceived to be Justin. He remembered somewhere in the back of his mind that it was not Justin, but every one of his other senses told him that it was. Brian's hands trembled as he stormed toward the young man and pushed him back onto the bed. He tore the top of a condom wrapper off with his teeth, spit it out, and put it on.  
  
With out a second's hesitation, he entered the young man, finding immediately that this was his trick's very.  
  
First.  
  
Time.  
  
The blond man let out a pained squeal and scratched at the sheets trying to get away. Brian immediately pulled out, his expression that of a provoked animal at best.  
  
Before whatever was left of Brian could stop whatever had taken over, he had grabbed the young man and pinned him down. He reached to his left and grabbed from his bedside table an ashtray. He raised his arm in the air and brought down the ashtray against the young man's head, the cries of fear and panic stopped abruptly. Again and again he brought down the ashtray until the force of the blows broke it in two.  
  
The inside edges of each half were sharp, much to Brian's delight, and he pressed the flat, broken edge of the ashtray vertically to the young man's throat, and with likely unneeded pressure began to drag downward and incise his flesh. Brian's breathing became measured, almost as though abated by the sight of love. The young man's blood began to flow, slowly but surely across his bare chest and over Brian's fingertips.  
  
He leaned forward and pressed a gentle kiss to the dying young man's lips as he further dragged the implement downward along his torso. The young man, though in shock, gasped as Brian dipped his fingertips into the now gaping open wound. A pleasured shudder came over Brian as the familiar warmth enveloped his fingers.  
  
He pulled away from the wound until the severed, raw, aching nerve endings could feel only the heat radiating from Brian's fingers. He gently traced the wound, once again dipping them in where the wound ended, directly above the genitalia. The young man still lived. His chest rose and fell beneath Brian's palm, which still rested, pressing flatly alongside the young man's exposed sternum.  
  
Death came slowly to the young man, his body twitching, pulsing with each touch from Brian's fingertips. Rather loudly, he began to gurgle, for in the reaper's most cruel form of jocularity, the young man began to slip out of shock, feeling, seeing, and knowing everything that was happening as clear as day. Through the gurgling, he began to form words.  
  
"Pl...ease... Plea...se?"  
  
Brian recoiled rather sharply, falling back off of the bed. His hands were covered in the young man's blood to the wrists. The young man sat up, the wound now gaping. From where Brian sat, he could see clearly, the beating heart behind his ribcage. The young man stood, his intestines falling to his feet at the foot of Brian's bed.  
  
Brian groaned in horror and tried to back away, stopped by the divider between his room and the rest of the loft. The young man fell to the hardwood floor face first, stone dead. It took until just then for Brian to notice the stark white strip of skull peeking through the blunt force wound he had caused on the side of the young man's head.  
  
The longer Brian looked at the mess he had made of a human being, the more rapidly his normal identity came forward, and soon, there was the Brian Kinney, staring at his new undertaking. He quite abruptly turned and vomited on the steps leading up to his room. His gaze snapped directly ahead as heard the door to the loft roll gradually open.


End file.
